A summary of India-Ireland cricket

Here is the short, short history of T20Is between India and Ireland:

The match in England in 2009 was during the T20 World Chapionship.

And here is the equally short history of ODIs between these teams:

The 2011 and 2015 matches were in the course of the World Cups.

Apart from these matches, India played South Africa in a bilateral series called the Future Cup in 2007, winning 2-1:

http://www.espncricinfo.com/ci/engine/series/index.html?season=2007;view=season

A quick look at T20I records between these teams:

Highest innings:

Best innings bowling:

Best innings fielding:

Allround performance: 20 runs and 2 wickets in a match:

No instances.

India has visited Ireland a number of times in the past, as the usual practice has been to tag on short visits to Ireland whenever there is a major tour of England. Most of these matches have been one or two day matches which have neither List A nor first-class status.

India’s maiden tour of England in 1932 seems to have included matches against almost all the counties as well as other teams, but did not include a visit to Ireland.

However, India did play one first-class match against Ireland in 1936. The scorecard is worth recalling as it captures the essence of that tour:

http://static.espncricinfo.com/db/ARCHIVE/1930S/1936/IND_IN_ENG/IND_IRELAND_09-11JUL1936.html

Points to note:

Vizzy captained in this match and made his customary single digit score.

Lala Amarnath did not play.

India won by 10 wickets, thanks mainly to CK Nayudu (7wi and 10wm) and Merchant (71*).

 

 

 

 

 

Records of “Ashes” ODIs-2

Continuing the studies of past ODIs involving England and Australia.

Bowling:

Most wickets (20 and above):

Brett Lee leads by a large margin over the runner-up McGrath. Rashid and Ali lead among current players.

Brett Lee is the only one to have taken more than one fiver. He also has taken the most (4) 4+ hauls.

Best innings bowling (including all 5wi):

Not much from recent times, the best being 5-35 by Tom Curran earlier in 2018. Bichel’s 7-34 came in a hard-fought World Cup match. Similarly for Gilmour’s 6-14 in the semi-final of the first World Cup. Both of them made useful contributions with the bat as well, 34* by Bichel and 28* by Gilmour (useful when the team is 39/6 chasing 94).

Best bowling averages (Minimum 1000 balls, all cases):

McGrath and Lee lead, with Rashid and Ali lead amongst the present players.

The best economy rate is 4.02 by Botham, and the best strike rate 29.8 by Rashid.

Fielding:

Most dismissals (15 and above):

Gilchrist leads but Buttler is quickly catching up. Buttler also has the most stumpings.

The most dismissals by non-keepers are 18 by Strauss and 17 by Clarke and Ponting.

Most dismissals in an innings (4 and above):

Gilchrist is the only one with 6 dismissals.

Dismissal rate (Minimum 20 innings, 0.500):

Gilchrist and Buttler lead. Root has the best amongst non-keepers.

All-round performances:

Career (see criteria in table):

Surprisingly Collingwood comes up higher than Botham and Johnson, mainly because of his batting.

Match performance (Minimum 30 runs and 3 wickets):

The best performance here would be Bichel’s in the 2003 World Cup, probably followed by Maxwell’s in 2015.

 

 

Records of “Ashes” ODIs-1

I do not normally cover limited-over series where India is not involved. The just-concluded England-Australia series was the first one to be won by a 5-0 margin, so it was a good time to review all ODIs between these teams from 1971 to 2018. Remember that the first-ever ODI was played between these teams in 1971.

As on June 25, 2018, 147 ODIs had been played between these teams. Eng won 61, Aus 81 and there were 2 ties and 3 no-results.

In England: 68 ODIs, Eng 34, Aus 30, Tie 2, NR 2

In Australia: 71 ODIs, Eng 25, Aus 45, Tie 0, NR 1

Neutral: 8 ODIs, Eng 2, Aus 6, no tie or NR.

Now for batting records:

Most runs (750 and above):

Morgan is by far the highest scorer, with Ponting making the most for Australia. Finch, Buttler and Roy represent the current players besides Morgan.

The most centuries are 6 by Finch, 5 by Ponting and 4 by Gooch

The most 50+ scores  are 16 by Morgan followed by 13 by Gooch and Ponting.

Highest innings (110 and above):

Jason Roy holds the record for the highest score, which was made earlier in 2018. From the current series we have 147 by Hales, 139 by Bairstow, 131 by SE Marsh, 120 by Roy and rounded up by Buttler’s 110* in the 5th match.

Highest batting averages (minimum 20 innings, minimum 30.00):

Martyn is somewhat unexpectedly on the top, followed by Finch and Buttler among current players.

Highest batting strike rates (Minimum 500 balls faced, minimum 75.00):

It is not surprising that the first 4 places go to current players headed by Roy and Buttler.

To be continued

The land of long names

Undivided Andhra Pradesh was the land of long and unpronounceable place names. Make special note of the full names of Shivrampally and Jogulamba at the end. Shivrampally has to accommodate 4 languages on its board.

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

OLYMPUS DIGITAL CAMERA

The longest railway tunnels in India-June 2018

The list of long railway tunnels in India have undergone frequent changes in recent years. Fortunately the Wikipedia article seems to have been kept up to date:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_rail_tunnels_in_India_by_length

In undivided India the 3.92 km long Khojak tunnel in Baluchistan had been opened in 1892; for more details see :

https://abn397.wordpress.com/2015/08/28/the-rail-tunnel-in-baluchistan-which-appeared-on-a-currency-note/

This was in fact the longest rail tunnel in South Asia until the Konkan Railway opened in the late 1990s. As you can see from the above list, the majority of the long tunnels are on the Konkan route. The longest is the Karbude tunnel at 6.5 km.

Some other longer tunnels opened in recent years the Sangar tunnel (2.4 km) on the Jammu-Udhampur section and the slightly longer Khowai tunnel on the Karimganj-Agartala section which was recently converted from MG to BG. Other examples in the North-East included some old and new ones on the Lumding-Badarpur section, and some yet to come up in Manipur. One tunnel of 1.9 km length on the existing Lumding-Badarpur metre gauge alignment has been abandoned, although a longer one on 3.2 km has come up on the new BG alignment.

There are some older and shorter tunnels on the trunk lines, notably at Monkey Hill, Parsik, Saranda and Gurpa.

However, the longest tunnel on IR is the 11.2 km long Pir Panjal tunnel between Banihal and Qazigund which provides a link between Jammu and Srinagar. More details can be seen here:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pir_Panjal_Railway_Tunnel

Opened in 2013, it will be part of the main route into the Kashmir valley once the problem-ridden section between Katra and Banihal is completed in the next few years. At the moment it serves a number of DMU passenger trains between Banihal and Baramulla (though some run only upto Budgam just north of Srinagar). These trains seem to be popular with the local people at the Banihal end as they save a lot of time and distance compared to the road route between Banihal and Qazigund. And the rail route is far less likely to be disrupted by snow than the road route.

It is likely to be the longest rail tunnel in India for a long time to come. There is expected to be a 8-km long tunnel on the uncompleted Katra-Banihal section which would take over the second spot from the Karbude tunnel. It will still exceed the two long road tunnels under construction at the Rohtang Pass and Patnitop, although the latter would also result in a considerable saving in distance on the Udhampur-Banihal road route.

My grandfather’s clock…….

Ever wondered why the tall pendulum clocks are called grandfather clocks? It is most probably due  to a 19th-century children’s song. A more recent version by Johnny Cash can be seen here with lyrics:

This was popular in the 1960s.

However, our home has a clock which is not exactly a grandfather clock in the normal sense, but does have a pendulum and needs to be wound every 7 days. A catalogue picture of a  very similar model:

It was bought by my grandfather or his brother in 1915, probably from Delhi. It was manufactured by the Seth Thomas Clock Company of Pennsylvania with a patent registered in 1876.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seth_Thomas_Clock_Company

It seemed to have  hung in the hall of the pharmacy which my family used to run. It outlived my grandfather (who lived to be 90) and his siblings, and stood there until 2004.

After some long-overdue maintenance, it is still working in our drawing room. Unlike the clock in the song, it went on to outlive the children of the purchaser (some of whom lived to their mid-80s) and after 102 years is still serving the 3rd and 4th generation.

The American concept of built-in obsolesence was certainly not valid to the manufacturers of a century ago.

Technical notes: It shows the day, date and month which probably means it was state-of-the-art in the 1910s. That part of the mechanism still is in working condition, but we leave it alone because it needs too many manual adjustments. Timekeeping is as good as can be expected, with a variation of less than 2 minutes in a week.

New records in List A and ODI cricket

Here are the highest scores in List A cricket as on 20 Jun 2018:

Live link for all scores of 375 and above:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/records/117937.html

England’s 481/6 is the highest ever ODI score and the second-highest List A score.

The previous ODI record score was England’s 444/3 against Pakistan in 2016-also at Nottingham!

It is also surprising that No 2 and No 3 on this list were both made on June 19, 2018 with India A also getting into the act.

And that Trent Bridge, Nottingham accounts for No 2, 4 and 5 on the list.

The highest List A and ODI score made against Australia is 438/9 by SA at Johannesburg in 2006, which was then a record in all ODIs, besides an 1-wicket win against a supposedly impregnable score of 434/4 made by Australia (which was an ODI record for a few hours).

We now look at the record defeats in List A matches.

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283904.html

England’s 242-run defeat of Australia is quite far down in List A matches and even in ODIs.

We now look at record ODI totals as on 20 June 2018:

Live link for ODI scores above 350:

http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/records/211599.html

Highest win margins in ODIs  as on 20 Jun 2018:

Live link: http://stats.espncricinfo.com/ci/content/records/283902.html

This is the highest winning margin for England in all ODIs

and the highest losing margin for Australia.

Finally we look at “Ashes” ODIs:

Highest totals:

A big jump over the previous record of 342, where one of these scores was made on June 16 in the previous ODI at Cardiff.

Highest victory margins:

From this we see that the previous highest margin in an Aus v Eng ODI was 162 runs by Australia back in Feb 1999. The highest winning margin by England was “only” 101 runs even further back in 1977.

 

 

FIFA World Cup-where West Germany tripped up in 1974 and still won

Much is being made of Germany’s defeat by Mexico. Something even weirder happened in the 1974 tournament which was hosted by West Germany.

It was the “poor cousin” East Germany who did the tripping. This was their only appearance in the FIFA tournament. Of course, the country ceased to exist in 1990 and whatever good players existed at that time became part of the united German team. They must have outlived the Trabant but probably did not have as much staying power as fellow Easterner Angela Merkel had.

In 1974, 16 teams took part in 4 groups of 4. Group 1 consisted of East Germany, West Germany, Chile and Australia.

West Germany started off with an 1-0 win against Chile. The match between the two Germanys was the last match of the group.

Somehow or other East Germany won 1-0, with the goal scored by Jurgen Sparwasser.

Finally the results for group 1 read East Germany 5, West Germany 4, Chile 2 and Australia 1. Thus the two Germanys advanced to the second round.

In that tournament the second round had two groups A and B each with 4 teams. The 4 teams played a league, and the toppers from A and B went to the finals and the runners-up went to the 3rd-place match. There were no semi-finals.

In Group A, East Germany lost 1-0 to Brazil, 2-0 to Netherlands and drew 1-1 with Argentina. The pool result was Netherlands 6, Brazil 4, East Germany 1, Argentina 1. Thus ended East Germany’s only World Cup appearance.

In Group B, West Germany beat Yugoslavia 2-0, Sweden 4-2, and Poland 2-0. The pool result was West Germany 6, Poland 4, Sweden 4 and Yugoslavia 0.

Poland beat Brazil 1-0 for the 3rd place.

In the final at Munich, West Germany won 2-1 against Netherlands with goals scored by Johan Neeskens from a penalty in the 2nd minute. Paul Breitner equalized from a penalty in the 25th minute. “Der Bomber” Gerd Muller scored in the 44th minute, and thus the home team won the 1974 tournament with a 2-1 victory.

That was Muller’s last international appearance. His record of 14 goals in the World Cup stood as a record until being surpassed by Ronaldo and Miroslav Klose in recent years.

Many of the Netherlands team went on to lose the 1978 final to Argentina, who hosted that tournament. Still later the Dutch were runners-up to Spain in 2010 in South Africa. Netherlands is still to win a World Cup final.

FIFA World Cup 1930-2018 in a larger nutshell

Here we list the top 4 teams in each edition of the tournament, as well as the winners of the Golden Boot and Golden Ball (and their predecessors).

Note that the terms Golden Boot and Golden Ball came into use only in 1982, though awards for best player were made from the earliest tournaments.

FIFA World Cup 1930-2018 in a nutshell

A brief look at the top 4 teams in each tournament since 1930:

It is interesting that in 21 tournaments there have been only 8 winners: Uruguay, Italy, West Germany/Germany, Brazil, England, Argentina, France and Spain. Among these, England and Spain have won only once.

 

 

Previous encounters between Afghanistan and India

Afghanistan’s first Test gets under way at Bengaluru on Jun 14. We look at past encounters between the teams in limited overs cricket.

There is not much to write about. The teams have met only in one ODI and two T20Is and India have won all of them.

The ODI was in the course of the 2014 Asia Cup. India won by 8 wickets.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/8532/scorecard/710307/afghanistan-vs-india-9th-match-asia-cup-2013-14/

The two T20Is were in the World T20I Championships in 2010 and 2012. India won by 7 wickets and by 23 runs.

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/8604/scorecard/412679/afghanistan-vs-india-3rd-match,-group-c-world-t20-2010/

http://www.espncricinfo.com/series/8604/scorecard/533274/afghanistan-vs-india-3rd-match,-group-a-world-t20-2012-13/

A sobering thought for Afghanistan: Among the other 11 Test teams, only Australia have won their first Test and only Zimbabwe drew their first Test. The other 9 all lost their maiden Test efforts.

The previous Test entrant Ireland had one previous Test player in Boyd Rankin. Afghanistan has none. But as in the case of Ireland, most of the team have long experience in ODIs and T20Is.

Unusual dismissals-obstructing the field

One of the sore points of India’s defeat in the Asia Cup final against dismissal was the unusual dismissal (obstructing the field) of Anuja Patil for 3. She thus became the first player to be so dismissed in a women’s T20I match.

There is no such instance in women’s Tests.

There is one instance in ODIs, again from India. D Kamini (2) was dismissed the same way against the West Indies in 2016.

This mode of dismissal is quite rare in men’s cricket too.

Tests: Only one instance, Len Hutton (27), E v SA in 1951.

ODIs: 6 instances, starting with Ramiz Raja (99) against England in 1987. This was in an ODI series after the 1987 World Cup. The last instance was by Ben Stokes, E v A in 2015.

T20Is: Only one instance, Jason Roy (67), E v SA in 2017.